


Avenues of Information

by Miri1984



Category: Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)
Genre: M/M, Manipulation, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-25
Updated: 2019-11-25
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:41:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21563146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miri1984/pseuds/Miri1984
Summary: What exactly happened during Bertie and Oscar's night at the Ritz? (sex isn't very explicit, E tag is more for the manipulative aspect of it)
Relationships: Sir Bertrand "Bertie" McGuffingham/Oscar Wilde
Comments: 6
Kudos: 69





	Avenues of Information

A new team was always something of a risk, for a person in Wilde’s position, but there were currents working underneath London and surrounding Europe that meant he didn’t necessarily trust those he already handled, and it was always good to have more than one iron in the fire. Metaphorically, of course. There was never any shortage of mercenaries looking for work in London, and Wilde kept his eyes and his ears out, through official and unofficial channels.

Zolf Smith was an intriguing new arrival on the scene, and Wilde wouldn’t deny that the thought of sending an ex-pirate cleric of Poseidon to Edison’s self aggrandizing gala didn’t tickle his sense of the ridiculous.

Not that Haringay knew Wilde was the one who’d gently prodded him towards the man. Wilde was a lot more subtle than that. A lot more subtle than Lady Starling too, for that matter, but there was a reason she was head of the agency and Wilde was merely… an asset.

As with most agents in the field, it was best for them to find their own working team, so Wilde was happy enough to let Zolf attempt to recruit on his own. Of course, it was also good policy to put an irritant in with the oysters, so to speak, so Figgis was dispatched. If there was ever anyone likely to produce a pearl...

When reports returned to him, after the disaster at Edison’s party, of who Zolf had finally ended up with, he was more than a little surprised. Sasha Rackett - a name that was familiar although the face was not - was actually the least surprising of the lot, the kind of recruit a man with a keen eye for talent would jump at, and Zolf certainly seemed to have a keen eye. Her ties to the underworld would be useful, possibly almost as useful as her impressive skillset. 

The other two… though.

Wilde was familiar enough with the trappings of family and money to understand why Hamid Saleh Haroun al-Tahan might have ended up pursuing the dangerous life of a mercenary, and a little judicious digging uncovered some quite simply fascinating pertinent details about his recent exit from Cambridge. A young man from a large and powerful family, disgraced and no doubt all but disowned by his parents, he would indeed be attracted to the mercenary life. It would be a chance to distinguish himself, both from his past and his mistakes. Hamid Saleh Haroun al-Tahan was a surprise, but Wilde could follow the logical path of his motivations, and so he was content enough with Zolf’s decision.

Sir Bertrand MacGuffingham, though.

Wilde looked through papers and reports and witness testimonies for days. He sat at his desk and drummed his fingers on it, staring at the wall opposite and pondering the problem that was Sir Bertrand MacGuffingham, a man whom for all intents and purposes was a feckless dandy with the moral backbone of a slug, but who for some reason had suddenly decided the pursuit of glory and honour was more important than his own quest to outdo even Wilde in displays of hedonism and excess.

Some of the reports, from people Wilde knew well, were positively  _ intriguing. _ But none of them held even the slightest hint of why, after the sudden death of his parents, he might want to get down and dirty with an assassin from other London and an ex-pirate, unless his pursuit of pleasure had taken a turn towards the dark and dangerous.

It happened. But if that was the case there was a high chance Bertie could be a liability to the group, a disruption and a distraction. After their stellar work in other London, Wilde was not willing to let the question of Bertie go unanswered, and so he took the somewhat unprecedented decision to meet with them all personally.

It would be an opportunity to see precisely how much responsibility to give Zolf, for one. That they had brought back so much information already was promising, far more promising than any of their other agents, and Wilde was fairly certain, given everything he’d managed to find out about Bertie, that he could persuade the man to… open up… regarding his motives for joining the group.

#

He had not expected them to be so utterly delightful. Of course, Zolf despised him, Sasha mistrusted him, and that was utterly fine. They would both be far too busy attributing Oscar’s interest in  _ them  _ as an addendum to his interest in Bertie, which, if he was being fair, was at this point mostly true. Hamid was more inscrutable, but then Hamid, Oscar suspected, recognised in Wilde the same kind of skillset as he employed himself. One didn’t walk through life with eyes as soulful and round as those, set in a face with such a perfect bow of lips, and  _ not  _ occasionally take advantage of them to get what one wanted.

On that point, Oscar revised his opinion of Zolf’s motivations for recruiting the halfling. Hamid was a perfect face for the group, someone who could negotiate through the power of charm and money and a well known name to get them through those doors that Sasha could not unlock and Zolf could not bash through with his unsurprisingly solid head.

Admittedly, taking that head to his face hadn’t been part of his agenda, but it was hardly the first time Oscar’s persona had provoked violent reprisal, and Bertie’s instinctive defense made him smile to himself in satisfaction for a job well done.

Bertie was open to suggestion, pliable, and utterly unaware of Oscar’s motives. Gaining the information he needed would be as simple as picking out the notes of a child’s nursery rhyme.

And almost certainly far more pleasurable.

#

Oscar made sure to arrive precisely thirty minutes late, correctly assuming that Bertie would also have attempted to arrive second. At this point, however, Bertie wanted Oscar more than Oscar wanted Bertie, and Oscar knew that patience and restraint were most definitely not part of his personality. Indeed when Oscar arrived Bertie was attempting (poorly) not to show their opposites, seated at the table in the suite in the Ritz, a half drunk glass of wine in his hand, a half empty bottle of it on the table.

“Ah, Mr Wilde,” he said, surging to his feet as the concierge let Oscar in. He was, thankfully, not dressed in the armor, and Oscar could make out the telltale signs of excess and luxury in his physique. Yet there was hard muscle under the layer of soft, decadent flesh, and Bertie’s grip when he took Wilde’s hand had strength and purpose behind it.

“Sir Bertrand,” Oscar said, smiling warmly, letting his eyes drop to Bertie’s lips then back up to his eyes. “An absolute pleasure to be in your company.”

#

Two more glasses of wine (to Oscar’s barely sipped one, a delightful vintage, one that Bertie guzzled with all the sophistication only the most pompous of the aristocracy managed to eschew) and Bertie was waxing lyrical about his exploits in other London, disguising himself as a statue, no less.

“A statue, you say?” Oscar leaned forward, resting his chin in his palm, long fingers tracing a pattern on the cloth of the table, almost, but not quite, reaching the stem of Bertie’s wine glass, around which Bertie’s own thicker, stronger fingers curled. Bertie’s eyes followed the path of his fingers and Oscar saw his tongue dart out to wet his lips. “Firm and upstanding and golden, no doubt?”

“Most definitely, Mr Wilde,” Bertie said, voice lowering. “Harder than diamond, and far more resolute.”

“Please, Sir Bertrand. My friends call me Oscar.”

Bertie let out a low rumble. “Well then, Oscar, one might even say as a statue I was an embodiment of raw physical power, coiled and ready to strike against the base nature of man’s inhumanity to man…”

“And as such you went on to…”

“Slice a man in two, actually. Quite neatly, although Hamid was slightly put out by it. Don’t know why. Oh well, actually do know why, he did have something of a weak stomach back in the day.”

Oscar laughed. Bertie was, actually, quite amusing, and wine and warmth had smoothed any remaining tension from his shoulders so he was fully relaxed in the chair opposite, long legs crossed over each other and his free arm hanging loosely over the back of his chair. 

He’d reached a tipping point, where he trusted Oscar enough to fully open up, and Oscar’s mouth watered a little in anticipation of the dance to come.

Accordingly, he reached forward and brushed his hand over Bertie’s knuckles. 

“Such violence is sometimes necessary in today’s world, no?” he said. “Especially in your current line of work.”

Bertie’s hand did not move, but his eyes dropped to the table and Oscar saw him suck at his cheek, one side of his mouth lifting. 

“One’s current line of work does lead to certain… tensions,” Bertie said.

“Oh I can only imagine,” Oscar said, resting his hand fully on Bertie’s now, the finger that had traced delicate patterns on the cloth of the table now lightly brushing them into heated skin. “I can only imagine what a man like you, loaded with wealth and charisma and opportunity, could possibly want with such a life.”

Bertie captured Oscar’s hand and brought it to his lips. “Violence is a means to an end, Oscar,” he said.

“Mmmm,” Oscar replied. “And what ends are you interested in, Sir Bertrand?” he asked, tracing Bertie’s bottom lip with his thumb. 

Bertie drew the digit into his mouth and sucked, lightly. “I think it might be time to find out, don’t you?”

#

Oscar lay back on the couch, lazily fingering himself open for Bertie, who was in the process of undressing. Bertie had been far more keen to divest Oscar of _ his _ clothing, something that Oscar was all too willing to allow, understanding the full impact of the movements of his hands, the artful positioning of his limbs, the lazy stroke of his hand over his cock while Sir Bertrand fussed with his own clothing as what they nearly always were for Oscar - an exercise in power.

Oscar knew far too well how much easier it was to manipulate from a position of perceived vulnerability.

Bertie’s clumsy desperation was endearing, and arousing, and when he finally settled over Oscar, huffing and puffing with want (and oh, there was a perfect title for an article, right there) the blue in his eyes swallowed by black, Oscar couldn’t help but reach up to tangle his hand in Bertie’s hair and gently pull his face down for a kiss. There was a special satisfaction to this, and he arched his back as Bertie sank into him, letting out a low, rumbling groan that resonated through Oscar pleasantly. Oscar hooked a long leg around Bertie’s waist, using one hand to explore the expanse of his skin and the other to control his own pleasure.

Bertie was surprisingly gentle, more so than Oscar usually liked, to be frank. He probably believed himself to be a considerate lover. He probably was. Oscar certainly enjoyed himself, but more particularly, he enjoyed Bertie’s enjoyment of  _ him  _ and when he buried his face in Oscar’s neck and let out a long, low groan as he came Oscar planted kisses in the hollow of his neck and stroked his fingers through Bertie’s hair and lined up all of the questions he wanted to ask in order of importance.

He was nothing if not thorough.

#

Back in the office the following day he was back to tapping his fingers on his lips (slightly swollen and a little sore) and staring at the wall as he contemplated what he’d been able to pull from Bertie. 

He was hiding something, that much was obvious. Oscar had been certain he would be able to coax it out of him, had used a great deal of his most persuasive arguments, but had come up short of an actual confession or a satisfactory explanation for his sudden change of direction. There was motivation there, however, and there was  _ purpose.  _ Whether or not it would affect the group dynamic, though, that was the question.

He reached for his pen, smoothing paper across his desk. Bertie needed to be persuaded to stay loyal to Zolf and the others, despite whatever secondary motive he might have, and for that he would need to push them closer together, make them care about each other’s  _ reputations.  _

Oscar thought of gentle kisses and soft promises, of the vulnerability of  _ want  _ and the rustle of fluttering pink feathers…

A smile touched his lips as he began to write.


End file.
